Saying “we shouldn't give people 99 weeks to do nothing,” former House Speaker Newt Gingrich says all recipients of unemployment insurance should be required to sign up for a job training program.

In an interview with 970 WLFA radio in Tampa, Gingrich said unemployed Americans should be willing to do agricultural jobs being done by illegal immigrants.

The GOP presidential candidate was asked about Florida’s large agriculture industry which depends in part on illegal immigrants.

“It should also be dependent on Americans who are unemployed,” Gingrich replied.

“I mean, what is there about our current system? And one example is, we should change unemployment compensation so if you need unemployment compensation, you also sign up for a training program run by a business.

"I mean, we shouldn't give people 99 weeks to do nothing. And then we say, we can't get people to work, well, no, you've given them 99 weeks of money, with no requirement for any effort."

“There’s an oddity that we have a very high unemployment rate, but in fact, people won’t do, there are whole sections where you say, basically, unless you allow foreigners to come here, the work just won’t get done.”

He said he does believe there should be a guest worker program, run by “American Express, Visa or Master Card, because they actually know how to run those kind of programs with minimal fraud.”